At Least He Can Act
by Monroe-Militia
Summary: After Nora introduces Charlie to a very adult show, Charlie spends a lot of time at Miles' apartment catching up on it and ogling at Sebastian Monroe away from her mother's disapproving eyes. She doesn't fully understand why her uncle gets so huffy about it until his egotistical best friend, Bass, comes to town.
1. Chapter 1

Miles was out picking his friend Bass up at the airport when Charlie let herself into her uncle's apartment to go watch some more of the show that she had gotten more than a little too invested in lately. Nora was the one who had gotten her into it. Charlie had caught her watching it and almost immediately had it bad for one of the main characters.

The fact that it was a very adult show had not helped with that addiction and it only fueled her fantasies even further, not that she would ever admit to her family that she spent more time than could really be deemed sane imagining herself in the place of whatever lucky character she had watched Jimmy King get intimate with last. It was beginning to become a real problem since she could hardly even follow the plot when his clothes came off and she was left too busy ogling and fantasizing to really remember what was going on.

That was why she watched it at her uncle's place instead of at home. Sure, he complained about the amount of male nudity, but it was still a much better option than staying at home with her mother hovering over her disapprovingly.

* * *

Miles had to hold back a groan as he walked into his apartment and heard the faint sounds of his TV.

"Really, Charlie?" He called out. "You're watching that crap here again?"

"Believe it or not, my mom is even less of a fan of Sebastian Monroe's ass than you are," she shouted back to him.

"What's wrong with my ass?"

Charlie froze in place. She knew that voice. God knows she had imagined it moaning out her name and whispering dirty little things into her ear enough to recognize it anywhere. But what the hell was that voice doing in her uncle's apartment?

She looked up and froze as she stared open-mouthed at where _the_ Sebastian Monroe was now standing, just inside the doorway and looking expectantly over at her uncle.

Oh god, he was in the same room as her and she was just sitting there stupidly, incapable of any kind of coherent thought. How was he even better looking in person? And, Christ, that beard was doing things to her. He was always clean shaven on the show, but this was so much better and now she was imagining the scratch of his scruff all over her body. Starting up by her temple as he whispered filthy little things to her, then drifting lower. Along her jawline. Brushing past her collarbone, only to hesitate between her breasts. Him looking up at her with mischievous eyes before pulling the fabric up and out of the way. The feel of his stubble prickling across her chest as he worshipped every inch before trailing sloppy, open-mouthed kisses down. All the way down to her waistband where he barely even hesitated before-

Shit.

The silence made the moans coming from the TV even more noticeable and managed to drag her mind back to reality as she helplessly looked back and forth between the man standing there and the very inappropriate scene on the TV that she had been imagining herself in before he had shown up.

She quickly snatched up the remote and paused the show. She chose the exact wrong moment and tried not to flinch as the ass in question was frozen on the screen. She would have played it again to try to pause at a better time, but playing it again just to try to pause somewhere else would probably make things worse.

If Miles would have just figured out how to use a universal remote she wouldn't be in quite as big of a predicament as she looked longingly over at the remote that could turn the TV off, which just so happened to be positioned on the opposite side of the actor than she was. Oh God, and now he was staring over at the screen with a self-satisfied smirk. That wasn't nearly as bad as when he turned that dazzling grin over on her, seemingly enjoying watching just how flustered he was making her.

She really didn't understand why her uncle hadn't told her that his friend Bass was Sebastian Monroe or why no one in her family had thought to tell her that the man whose body she had been ogling at during all of those sex scenes was that of her uncle's friend who they probably all knew. She had thought that she had understood why Miles grumbled and groaned about her watching the show so much, but now she realized the true reason.

"I believe you're sitting on my bed," Sebastian freaking Monroe told her as if it was the most casual of comments.

Was he trying to torture her? She was already drenched and if he kept this act up, she was afraid that her juices were going to soak through her clothes and right onto the couch he was supposed to be sleeping on. She couldn't even think of words and her heart was pounding embarrassingly loudly as she stared up at him in a dumbfounded silence.

Luckily for Charlie, Nora turned into the room then and managed to pull some of the attention away from her as she took one look at the TV screen before turning her gaze over to Bass. "Nice ass."

"Don't feed his ego," Miles pleaded with his girlfriend. "It's already big enough."

Charlie bet that wasn't the only thing that was big.

It was clear that the compliment had already gone to the other man's head though as he smugly responded, "Thank you. Now tell that to your boyfriend. He seems to think that there's something wrong with it."

"The only thing wrong with it is that we don't get to see it more often," she told him. "But I guess we know which one of us has the better ass, since I haven't been getting any complaints."

Charlie stared in awe as Nora, the one who had introduced her to the show in the first place, so casually interacted with him. It only made her feel even more embarrassed by how flustered she had let herself become after being taken off-guard by his presence.

"Why didn't you tell me that you know him?" She finally managed to get out as Bass dropped his bag to the floor beside the couch.

"Right. Because I really wanted to be the one to tell you that the guy you've been spending so much time staring at also happens to be my best friend," Miles commented in an irritated tone. "I was hoping that you'd at least stay out of the way while he was here so that you wouldn't find out, but clearly that didn't exactly work out."

Charlie was going to argue that it was his fault for giving her her own keys to his place and not telling her not to come over, but instead she just ended up distracted all over again as Monroe sat down, a little too close to her, on his couch-bed. Dammit. She could smell his cologne from here. Of course the bastard had to smell good. The man smelled like pure sex and the hairs on her arm were standing up where he was practically touching her.

He reached over past one of her legs and she had to hold her breath to keep from letting out any embarrassing noises. She glanced down as he grabbed the remote out of her hand and she felt jolts of electricity run through where his fingers brushed against hers. What the hell was he doing?

He spread his legs out and leaned back to make himself comfortable as he hit the play button. The moans started up again full force as Charlie glanced down at where his leg was pressed against hers, then over to the TV, and then back at the cat-like grin that had spread across his lips as he happily watched her discomfort.

Fine. If he was going to find this so damn funny, then she wasn't going to let him win. She focused back onto the screen and barely even blinked as she stared at the screen and refused to even flinch or react to what seemed to her to be the longest sex scene ever.

Still, he must have noticed the heat that had rushed to her cheeks, since she could feel that his eyes had not left her yet as he asked, "What about you? Are you a fan of my ass?"

"It's alright I guess," Charlie responded nonchalantly as the scene finally changed and other, much more clothed, characters appeared. There was no way in hell that she was going to admit to him how big of a role his nudity played in her watching the show.

He let out a laugh at that as Miles shook his head in disbelief.

"Why did I invite you here again?" He grumbled.

"Because you missed me so damn much," Bass responded arrogantly.

"And I needed to remind myself of why I shouldn't," the other man added dryly.

* * *

 **A/N: Please read and review! :)**


	2. Chapter 2

Charlie was certain that Miles had nothing to do with her and Danny being invited over for lunch that Saturday, considering his original plan had been to hope that she wouldn't be around during Bass's visit so that she wouldn't find out he was Sebastian Monroe.

She couldn't make up her tangled mess of a mind, both hoping for and dreading the possibility he would be there. Sure, she wanted the chance to see him again and prove that she wouldn't be as flustered again. At the same time, she was terrified of seeing him after how embarrassing their first encounter had been.

Her brother seemed to find the whole situation hilarious. After she'd gone home, she had told him about it, excluding the details of how attracted to him she was, but explaining how they had first met each other and how much he seemed to have enjoyed bothering her. She regretted sharing that information as soon as Danny had told her that Nora had invited them to come over for lunch. He had taunted her more than enough beforehand and she was sure he was only going to embarrass her more if Monroe turned out to be there.

As she and Danny entered their uncle's apartment, Charlie tried to subtly peek around to see if the actor was there. She both felt a sense of relief and disappointment when she found that he wasn't.

* * *

Bass had gone for a long run and had worked up more than a little sweat in the process. By the time he got back to Miles and Nora's place, his hair was wet with sweat and he was starving.

He followed the smell wafting from the kitchen where Nora was cooking and Miles was leaning against the countertop watching like the obedient and utterly cooking impaired boyfriend he was.

Bass reached out to grab something to eat. It wasn't what he wanted and his stomach was growling at him to go for something bigger, but he figured that he should be able to get away with grabbing a carrot out of the salad. Clearly he thought wrong, since Nora quickly swatted his hand away.

"Not a chance," she told him.

"I already tried," Miles pointed out. It was clear from his tone it had not gone much better for him, but he seemed amused now that it was Bass getting in trouble. "She's not going to let you eat anything until it's done."

Nora crinkled her nose as she stepped a little too close to Bass. She turned to face him as she bluntly pointed out, "You stink. If you want food, then you had better shower before lunch."

He stifled a laugh. Nora never was one to pussy-foot around what she wanted to tell you. "Whatever you say."

"And don't even think about sitting on any of my furniture like that," she warned him.

"Yes ma' am." He called over his shoulder as he exited the room.

The first thing that caught his eye when he stepped into the living room was Miles' niece. She was sitting, legs folded beneath her, on the couch next to a boy with sandy blonde hair. He let his eyes linger on her for a little too long, sizing her up, before his lip quirked up and he turned for the hallway. This should be fun, at the very least he would get a kick out of seeing how uncomfortable he could make her.

"I thought he'd be taller," Danny pointed out, once the actor was out of the room.

His very presence seemed to loom over her. Charlie couldn't agree with her brother, but she cracked a smile anyways at her brother's underwhelmed response. She wished she could be so blasé around Monroe.

She had spent longer than she cared to admit wondering what she should wear, lest Sebastian Monroe attend lunch, but in the end had opted for her favourite pair of quite possibly over-worn jeans and a somewhat faded navy tank top she frequently wore with it. She wasn't about to dress up to try and impress the guy, but she also wasn't about to stoop to dressing down to prove how little she cared about what he thought of her... Or at least how little she _wished_ she cared.

Now, she was rethinking her whole outfit after the way his eyes had raked up and down her form before he had passed out of the room. It wasn't fair. He had shown up drenched in sweat, with his tight green v-neck clinging to his frame, and her heart had started pounding like Jimmy King had pounded into Hayden Rivers after she had saved him from execution by her own clan.

Great. Now her mind was already slipping to the sex scenes he knew she had seen him in. This was going to be a long lunch.

* * *

Ten minutes later, Bass emerged from the hallway with a towel resting low on his hips and his hair still wet enough that it was almost dripping.

Charlie's eyes immediately gravitated to his form as he swaggered into the room. Her eyes grazed down his hairless chest, then took a particular interest the muscular V where his towel dipped a little too low, and yet not low enough. Was he really trying to torture her personally or did he just feel the need to be the centre of attention at all times?

"I'm not feeding you if you don't put clothes on," Nora warned him. She'd finished cooking now and they were all waiting on him. Miles and Nora had joined the other two in the living room while Monroe had been in the shower and the scowl on Miles' face said he was not impressed with his friend's lack of clothing.

"Yeah, yeah," he responded, as if this was a complaint he was used to getting. "Just let me grab some. It's not my fault you invited people into my bedroom."

"Funny, last I checked it was my living room," Miles retorted.

The actor stepped further in the room and practically brushed past Charlie on his way to grab his bag off the floor. She marvelled at how confident he was in his towel's ability to stay on as she felt the heat radiating off of him against her leg.

She came back to her senses some, as he turned and set his bag down in an armchair. But as he leaned over to dig through his bag, she found herself staring at the towel over his ass and silently willing it to drop.

Something hit her in the side and she turned her head to find that Danny had elbowed her and now was giving her an incredulous look. While she was a little embarrassed that her brother had caught her blatantly ogling, she was glad that he had stopped her before she had embarrassed herself around Monroe any further or before Miles had looked in her direction and noticed where her eyes were resting. Maybe Danny could be a help to her instead of just revelling in her pain.

Okay, maybe Bass was taking a little longer to pick out clothes than he normally would have. But that's because he wanted to mess with Miles, who always seemed to wish that Bass would act at least a little ashamed of the body that he had gotten countless women with. Alright, and maybe he wanted to give Charlie the chance to stare a little and see if he could catch her getting all flustered again. After all, he needed some kind of entertainment here, and playing with her had the potential to be quite enjoyable.

He tossed a shirt onto the arm of the chair as he settled on it, then his phone began to ring loudly from where he had left it on the coffee table. One glance in its direction brought a tilted smile to his lips.

Bass tapped his phone to answer it and set it on speaker, then set it back down on the table so he could look through his bag for a decent pair of jeans.

"What's up, Duncan?" He questioned.

Duncan. As in Duncan Page. The woman who played Hayden, his character's on again/off again sexual partner. Charlie's interest was piqued.

"What are you wearing?" A silky voice asked through the phone.

"I just got out of a shower, so a towel," he responded.

"Want to work up a sweat all over again?" Duncan purred, causing him to let out a laugh. "How long until you can get here?"

"I'm in Chicago, so I think I'm going to have to take a rain-check," he told her.

"Alright, then phone sex?"

Miles' face fell into his hand.

"You're on speakerphone," Bass responded in a gruff tone.

"You're ready to go. Aren't you?" She asked. "Going to need both hands, huh?"

"Actually, I meant you're on speaker, so other people can hear you," he corrected.

"Kinky," Duncan commented in an amused tone.

He let out a low chuckle. "I think I'm going to have to take a rain-check on that too."

A sigh came from the other side of the phone. "You mean I have to go out and actually find someone to sleep with? I mean, not that it'll be that hard, but I'd prefer not leaving the house."

"Sorry," Bass told her in a not entirely apologetic tone. "You could try calling Scanlon. He clearly has a thing for you and would probably drop everything to come over."

"Thanks," she commented. "I'll talk to you later about what the hell you're doing in Chicago. Have fun with whatever you're up to."

"Do you think you could not take phone calls about sex on speakerphone?" Miles questioned the moment his friend hung up. "Especially while Charlie and Danny are here?"

Bass turned to Charlie as he pointed out, "Okay, first, she's seen the show so I know she's seen and heard worse. And second, I know for a fact that I've seen and heard worse from you and Nora on numerous occasions."

"He has a point," Nora responded with a shrug.

"Just put some clothes on," Miles grumbled out. "Before I change my mind about being happy you're here."

* * *

 **A/N: Please read and review! A huge thanks goes out to JM2788, yrut, Kggla, TexasRevoFan, maritza, and the two anonymous guests for reviewing last chapter! :)**


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